Katrine

Katrine, by Enilor Macartney
Lane

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Katrine, by Enilor Macartney Lane
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: Katrine
Author: Enilor Macartney Lane
Release Date: December 6, 2004 [EBook #14263]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KATRINE
***

Produced by Rick Niles, Melissa Er-Raqabi, Ronald Holder and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

[Illustration: "I HAVE WAITED ALL THESE YEARS"]

KATRINE
A Novel
BY
ELINOR MACARTNEY LANE
AUTHOR OF "NANCY STAIR" AND "MILLS OF GOD"

NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS
PUBLISHERS
MCMIX

Copyright, 1909, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
All rights reserved.
Published March, 1909.

To =Grant B. Schley=
Dear and great Friend! In =Katrine's= fancied "Land" You long have
held your own much-honored place-- Have met great Esmond; held
kind Newcome's hand; And talked with merry Alan face to face; For
there, where Loyalty was word of countersign, You entered, all
unchallenged, for the land was thine!
E.M.L.
PARIS, 1909

CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE PREFACE vii I. UNDER THE SOUTHERN PINES 1 II.
THE MEETING IN THE WOODS 15 III. A KINDNESS WITH
MIXED MOTIVES 29 IV. THE PROMISE IN THE ROSE GARDEN
43 V. FRANK FALLS FURTHER UNDER KATRINE'S
INFLUENCE 50 VI. DERMOTT GIVES A DINNER AT THE OLD
LODGE 63 VII. KATRINE'S OWN COUNTRY 76 VIII. FRANK
YIELDS TO TEMPTATION 88 IX. THE TRUTH 94 X. TO TRY TO
UNDERSTAND 104 XI. KATRINE IS LEFT ALONE 113 XII. THE
REAL FRANCIS RAVENEL 121 XIII. DERMOTT'S INTERVIEW
WITH FRANK AT THE TREVOY 127 XIV. DERMOTT
DISCOVERS A NEW SIDE TO FRANK'S CHARACTER 137 XV.
JOSEF 143 XVI. MRS. RAVENEL UNWITTINGLY BECOMES AN
ALLY OF KATRINE 152 XVII. MCDERMOTT VISITS HIS
FRENCH COUSIN 160 XVIII. KATRINE MEETS ANNE LENNOX
172 XIX. A VISION OF THE PAST 193 XX. THE INFLUENCE OF
WORK 212 XXI. THE NIGHT OF KATRINE'S DÉBUT 219 XXII.
FRANK AND KATRINE MEET AT THE VAN RENSSELAER'S 228
XXIII. AN INTERRUPTED CONFESSION 234 XXIV. "I WILL
TAKE CARE OF YOU" 249 XXV. KATRINE IN NEW YORK 271
XXVI. DERMOTT MCDERMOTT 282 XXVII. SELF-SURRENDER
299 XXVIII. UNDER THE SOUTHERN PINES ONCE MORE 303

PREFACE
It is difficult to tell the story of Irish folk intimately and convincingly,
the bare truths concerning their splendid recklessness, their
unproductive ardor, their loyalty and creative memories, sounding to
another race like a pack of lies.
When, therefore, I recall "The Singing Woman," Katrine; her beauty,
her fearlessness, her loyalty, her voice of gold--it seems as if only one
lost to caution and heedless of consequence would undertake her
history expecting it to be believed. But there is this advantage: the
newspapers, recording much of her early life, are still extant, her Paris

work discussed by Josef's pupils to this day, and her divine
forgetfulness the night she was to sing at the Metropolitan a known
thing to people of two continents; but unrecorded of her, till now, is
that, for love, like brave, mad Antony, she threw a world away.
It is impossible to tell the tale of Katrine without narrating side by side
the story of Dermott McDermott; and here trouble begins, for Ireland
would never allow anything written concerning him that was not
flattering, and the Irish people, especially in the regions of Kildare and
Athlone, have combined to make a saint of him. A saint of Dermott
McDermott! Heaven save the mark!
But of Frank Ravenel's life I can speak with truth and authority. I had
the story from his own lips under the pines and the stars of North
Carolina, fishing the Way-Home River, or sitting together on the
Chestnut Ridge, where Katrine and he first met. This was before he
became--before Katrine made him--the great man he is to-day.
* * * * *
And two things linger with me--the first a conversation between
Dermott and Katrine at the Countess de Nemours'.
"Tell me," said Katrine: "do you think any woman ever married the
man who was kindest to her?"
"It's unrecorded if it ever occurred," Dermott answered.
* * * * *
And a second, the truth of which is less open to dispute.
"Nora," Katrine asked, "could you ever have loved any but Dennis-your
first love?"
"No," answered Nora. "To an Irishwoman the drame comes but the
wance."
E.M.L.

KATRINE
I
UNDER THE SOUTHERN PINES
Ravenel Plantation occupies a singular rise of wooded land in North
Carolina, between Way-Home River, Loon Mountain, and the Silver
Fork. The road which leads from Charlotte toward the south branches
by the Haunted Hollow, the right